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What Siblings Learn From Each Other

It’s wonderful to have a playmate, especially if it is a brother or a sister. This togetherness plays a huge role in the way your baby learns about the world and everyone around it. This also tremendously influences your baby’s personality.

What Siblings Learn From Each Other

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It’s wonderful to have a playmate, especially if it is a brother or a sister. This togetherness plays a huge role in the way your baby learns about the world and everyone around it. This also tremendously influences your baby’s personality.

Siblings have their ups and downs which makes it exciting for them. But then again, that’s not all about their relationship. Siblings actually become the first proper teachers for a lot of skills and what they teach lasts a lifetime, be it learning the letters of the alphabet or a fun game. And more importantly, the main lessons of life — learning to compromise, help, share, cooperate and trust — a direct result of having to adjust to each other. These lessons go beyond the home, and help them deal with their friends and schoolmates.

Inter-personal relation depends on various factors.

The relationship between two siblings who’re born a year apart is dramatically different from two siblings born five years apart. And as they age, the way their equation with each other changes are also very different. A lot of factors like gender, age differences and the space between the birth of one baby and the other influence how siblings get along.

Few factors and their influences are:

Babies born after their sibling learn quicker. Babies born later reach a lot of developmental milestones much before their older sibling. This is because babies get the skills to imitate at around 15 to 18 months, that’s when they start imitating their older siblings. That’s why, When the younger baby discovers that the older sibling’s world has been enriched by friends, who have new experiences, opportunities and interactions to offer, they make friends more easily.

Babies born earlier than their sibling become more confident. Age difference is not just to the younger one’s advantage. Now that the older sibling has a younger one to look up to them, their confidence gets hugely boosted. This way their feeling of being displaced because more attention is given to the younger sibling is also dealt with. And if the age difference is 3 years or more, the older baby also gets protective about the younger one, learning how to be responsible in the process.

Sibling rivalry and conflict can be healthy. Fighting and conflict between siblings is very common even in calm periods and can actually be a good thing. But it is the level of warmth and support between them that balances the level of conflict. This affects how they are influenced by the relationship and how it is going be in the future. So if there is a moderate conflict, a decent amount of warmth and support helps babies learn better how to care for each other and deal with a conflict.

our siblings actually serve as our first effective teachers of a variety of skills, and the lessons we learn from them will last our entire lives. Sometimes the lessons are obvious such as learning the letters of the alphabet or how to add during an impromptu game of 'school.' Others are far more subtle: learning to compromise, share, and trust, all are by-products of being one of at least two children within a family.

The development of prosocial skills such as helping, sharing, and cooperating are highly influenced by siblings. The social skills children acquire from their relationships with their brothers and sisters extend beyond the home, also influencing interactions with peers

Older children, particularly those who enjoyed only child status for a time before a brother or sister's arrival, may relish their new position of a role model for the younger one .If there is a fairly large (at least three years) age difference, the older child may take on the role of protector for a younger sibling, and in the process learn about responsibility.

A moderate amount of sibling conflict is though acceptable and can play a potentially beneficial role in social interactions with peers. Conflict between siblings is a common occurrence and coexists with calm periods. But it is the level of conflict balanced with the level of warmth or support between siblings that determines the effect sibling relationship has on children. A moderate level of conflict along with moderate level of warmth and support in their relationship may help children develop important prosocial skills and skills of conflict negotiation.

A parent’s love can make up for the lack of a sibling.

Even though having a sibling comes with its benefits, not having one is not much to worry about. Because your and your partner’s love and care along with enough discipline can pretty much make up for all the learning that’ll happen with a sibling around. Just the way your love and care can do a lot of other good things to your baby!